Nichole Canuso | Branching Paths is an organization located in Philadelphia dedicated to creating collaborative movement-based performance experiences. Originally founded in 2004 as Nichole Canuso Dance Company, the company transitioned to Branching Paths in 2026.
Projects often sit at the crossroads of movement, visual art, and theater. Our work brings dance out of conventional spaces to engage audiences in adventurous ways. The company is currently exploring the interfaces of live, embodied presence with emerging technologies that challenge our definitions of human relationship. Collaboration and community partnerships fuel the work in both process and performance. All of the work is created through ensemble processes. The content of these projects embrace the values and lives of the people involved and the synergy created between audience and performer. We aim for a range of experiences, perspectives and bodies in the work, finding inspiration from the synergy of each performer’s energy, presence, and physical tendencies
Photo by Johanna Austin
Photo by Sarah Chandler
Each partnership and environment we work in influences the trajectory of the work. The role of the audience is deeply considered in each process, often inviting audience members to become co-creators of the experience. One recent project (Being/With, 2021) brought together two solo participants at a time – each in a separate location – in poetic encounters of live feed video imagery, movement prompts and interview structures.
Past projects include an exploration of separation and connection on both personal and epic scales featuring two performers separated in physical space who converge in a third cinematic space (Pandæmonium, 2016), a solo piece which questions, constructs and transforms the outlines of Canuso’s memories as she builds and takes apart her house (Midway Avenue, 2014), an immersive performance for 6 audience members at a time led via headset (The Garden of Forking Paths, 2017, The Garden, 2013); a collaboration with 6-piece band The Mural and The Mint (As the Eyes of the Seahorse, 2009); a hybrid of dance, installation, and cinema (TAKES, 2010); and a performance that roamed the halls and stairways of an historic Philadelphia church building (Wandering Alice, 2008).
We have been presented by New York Live Arts (New York, NY), The American Repertory Theater (MA), John Michael Kohler Arts Center (WI), Bates Dance Festival (ME), The Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center (MD), Los Angeles Performance Practice (CA), Dance Theatre Workshop (NYC), DancePlace (Washington, D.C.), Judson Church Movement Research Exchange (New York, Philadelphia), Links Hall (Chicago, IL), Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival (NYC), the International Festival of Art and Ideas (CT), HERE Arts Center (NYC), FringeArts (PA), Velocity Founders Theater (Seattle, WA), Sceinserge Performing Arts Biennale (Västerås, Sweden), Festival Internacional de Danza Contemporánea Onésimo (Guadalajara, Mexico), Festival Giornate del Respiro (Argentiera, Italy), and several colleges and universities nationwide. Commissions include American Philosophical Society Museum and The Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Photo by Kate Raines
Photo by Nicole Souza
About Nichole Canuso
(founder/artistic director)
Nichole Canuso is a choreographer, teacher and performer and founder/artistic director of NCBP. Dedicated to ensemble-generated processes, her work aims to create connections across distances and life experiences. Her dedication to dance manifests as performances, installations, films and intimate dialogues. Her projects often use technology to bring performers and audiences together in tender exchanges.
Canuso's choreographic projects have been presented by New York Live Arts (NYC), American Repertory Theater (MA), Los Angeles Performance Projects (CA), the Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival (NYC), HERE (NYC), The International Festival for Art and Ideas (New Haven, CT), Judson Church Movement Research(NYC), DancePlace (D.C.), Links Hall (Chicago), ODC (San Francisco), Velocity (Seattle) Trafo (Budapest, Hungary) Onèsimo International Dance Festival (Guadalajara, Mexico) Scenscierge Swedish Biennale (Västerås, Sweden) and Philadelphia FringeArts, who commissioned several of Canuso’s larger works. Choreographic residencies include 2009 and 2014 fellowships at the Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography (FL), MacDowell (NH), Millay (NY), Hambidge Center for Creative Arts and Sciences (GA), Dance OMI (NY), The Orchard Project (NY) Headlands Center for the Arts (CA) the BiLateral Residency (Budapest, Hungary) and Bogliaco Center (Luguria, Italy)
Choreographic commissions include The American Philosophical Society Museum and Philadelphia Museum of Art. In addition to her work with NCBP, selected collaborations include guest choreographer for A Fierce Kind of Love with Temple University Institute on Disabilities (2016–2020), performer in Bill Irwin’s The Happiness Lecture (2007-2009), and performer/creator in Pig Iron Theatre Company’s 3 woman clown play, FLOP (2001 - 2005). She was a company member of Headlong Dance Theater from 1997-2011 and co-directed Moxie Dance Collective from 1999 to 2003. She has been a faculty member of the MFA program at Rowan University/Pig Iron School for Advanced Performance Training (APT) since 2012. She is a 2017 Pew Fellow, a 2021 New York Stage and Film/NEXUS fellow and a 2025 United States Artist Fellow.
